‘It’s not a conventional engagement, though,’ Grace said, pursing her lips.
‘Which lets him out of buying her a ring, the shagger,’ Jack growled.
Grace was touched by Jack’s support. She knew he didn’t approve of what she was doing, but he approved of the Tree-hugger even less and had reluctantly agreed to be party to the plot.
‘And none of us is supposed to know about this?’ Lorcan asked.
‘No.’
‘So you thought it would be a good idea to call a family meeting to tell us.’
‘We need all the time we can get,’ Grace said defensively.
‘This isn’t about deciding what to get them for a wedding present, is it?’ Tom asked. He was entertaining serious doubts about the kind of family he had married into.
‘No, Tom, I’m afraid not,’ Lorcan answered dolefully. ‘I think my mother has something much more Machiavellian up her sleeve.’
‘So what exactlyarewe here for?’ Conor asked, impatient to get down to the business at hand, whatever it was. If someone would spit it out, he could get it sorted and everyone out of the house. He had important calls to make.
‘We’re here,’ Grace said, ‘to decide what we’re going to do about it. We can’t just let it happen and do nothing. We’re going to have a brainstorming session, and I want us to put our heads together and come up with some ideas.’
‘Ideas for what?’ Tom asked.
‘For breaking it up, of course,’ Lorcan told him.
‘Oh, come on, Lorcan,’ his mother chided. ‘You hate him as much as the rest of us. And you know he’s wrong for Kate.’
‘Yes, but don’t you think maybe we should respect Kate’s decision?’ he asked tentatively. ‘She’s old enough to know what she’s doing.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ His mother dismissed his qualms, as though she were swatting a fly. ‘Where would we be if we all minded our own business and let everyone run their own lives? Look at your auntie Sheila.’
Auntie Sheila was always trotted out at times like this, acautionary tale to anyone who advocated a non-invasive approach to family affairs.
‘What happened to Auntie Sheila?’ Tom asked.
‘She married a cult leader,’ Lorcan told him.
‘I’ve never heard about this before!’
‘He’s a skeleton in our closet,’ Lorcan said.
Sheila’s husband may have been a skeleton in the O’Neills’ closet, but Grace had no compunction about dragging him out and giving his bones a good rattle in the interests of bringing the family into line.
‘Her husband was a charlatan, Tom,’ Grace embellished. ‘He made poor Sheila’s life a misery – took all their money and ran off to Arizona to set up a commune.’
‘Golly!’
‘Yes, it was quite a shock.’
‘He now lives somewhere in the Sedona Desert with his ever-dwindling flock,’ Lorcan informed him. ‘There were only about six of them last we heard.’
‘He hadn’t started his cult when Sheila first met him, of course. But we always knew something wasn’t quite right about him. There were little signs,’ Grace continued, gazing melancholically into the middle distance. ‘He started wearing a poncho.’
‘A what?’ Tom thought he must have misheard.
‘A poncho, Tom,’ Lorcan prompted him. ‘Try to keep up.’
‘Ah, right,’ Tom nodded, as if this was a universally recognised sign of messianic tendencies.
